Tigran Gambaryan’s hearing has been moved to September 2 by the Nigerian government, so he will be in court sooner than planned. People are worried that moving Tigran Gambaryan’s hearing to September 2 will cause more problems, especially since Gambaryan still doesn’t have access to his lawyer.
Gambaryan was arrested by Nigerian officials in February 2024 on charges of money laundering. He was accused of $34 million worth of financial crimes. As his trial date gets closer, the fact that he doesn’t have a lawyer has caused a lot of concern. Binance CEO Richard Teng has publicly called the situation illegal.
Gambaryan’s health is said to have gotten a lot worse during his six months in jail, on top of the legal problems. His family has been worried, saying that Gambaryan is in a lot of pain because of an untreated fractured disc that makes it impossible for him to walk. Even so, his family has not even given him basic medical care or a wheelchair.
Richard Teng, CEO of Binance, has asked for Gambaryan’s release on humanitarian grounds and asked the Nigerian government to let him go back to the US for urgent medical care. Teng stressed how bad Gambaryan’s situation was and asked for mercy and justice.
To make things even more complicated, the Nigerian government has tied Binance to the sharp drop in the value of the naira, which is the country’s official currency. The government says that Binance’s peer-to-peer trade services made the naira less valuable, which caused it to drop by more than 50% in 2024. But Binance has claimed that it is to blame, saying that the naira’s fall continued even after the exchange stopped doing business in Nigeria in February 2024.
Soon, Gambaryan will be put on trial. What happens there could have big effects not only on him but also on Binance and the bitcoin scene in Nigeria as a whole.
